


when the trail runs out

by spacegirlkj



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), F/F, Hurt/Comfort, University, prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-18
Updated: 2017-04-18
Packaged: 2018-10-20 13:14:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10663359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacegirlkj/pseuds/spacegirlkj
Summary: Whether spring blooms or winter falls, whether summer sings or autumn drifts, they’ll walk together, side by side, hand in hand. Even if the sun doesn't shine, even when the trail runs out.





	when the trail runs out

**Author's Note:**

> hello!!! this is my piece for the run charity zine, which i am so grateful to have been apart of. thank you so much to everyone who bought it!!!!!  
> without further ado, i hope you enjoy this story for my favourite gal pals~

It’s always raining when Yachi goes to run with Kiyoko. The action is a rarity in itself— Yachi doesn't enjoy jogging up and down the trails around their apartment as much as she’d enjoy walking them with a drink in hand, but when her girlfriend comes to her with a proposition and a shy smile she wears so well, there’s no fight in her to say no. It’s calming, running alongside her, navigating the trails and watching Kiyoko’s relaxed expression as she focuses on the road ahead. Yachi doesn't understand the allure of the sport itself, the sweatiness and stress of reaching a destination, but she’d never say no if it meant being with Kiyoko.

And so she follows, in a sweatshirt that isn’t hers that slips off her shoulders, rain jacket bulleted by the showers above as she stumbles on rocks in attempt to avoid puddles. It’s hard to keep pace with tiny hurdles named nature dragging her behind, but Kiyoko slows to a steady jog until Yachi catches up, flicking her blonde bangs to the side and sending little droplets flying. She must look good amongst the rain, because Kiyoko’s face brightens enough to seem like the sun, and Yachi nearly trips over a stone from staring.

April pours down around them, soaks their shoes and punctures the silence with rain tapping leaves, gravel crunching under their feet. Despite all of the noise, the words unspoken are much louder, make Yachi’s stomach twist with fear of what happens when they reach the trail’s end. 

It’s Kiyoko’s last year in university, and Yachi’s second. For some reason, it feels like she’s only just caught up, feels like the two years spent in a shared apartment in the college town are two seconds spread over a millennia of shoddy faucets and sheets that always smelt like their lemon laundry detergent. Yachi wonders what it’ll be like when Kiyoko leaves. She’s studying psychology while Yachi studies literature, and when Yachi watches her graduate, it’ll be to law school to continue on, leaving her with her books in a flat meant for two, and empty bed too small for two people and much too large for just her.

It takes drowning her foot in a puddle to snap her out of her worry. There shouldn't be a reason for Kiyoko to leave her in the dust. They’ll still be in the same city, Kiyoko on another campus half an hour by train, commuting back and forth for class. Yachi wonders if it’s stupid to feel scared of distance, whether between them now— the silence, the space as Kiyoko continues ahead, or the one that Yachi always felt since first year, when she was kicking her feet against the desk in front of her and trying not to stare at the pretty girl in the other grade.

It’s ironic, really, the fact that she’s always been trying to catch up. The year they meet, Kiyoko moves on, and the ties between stretches the miles and grows thin without snapping. The thread pulls, and bends, and catches, keeps Yachi from falling behind— keeps Kiyoko from moving forwards. 

It’s about then that Yachi trips on a root and nosedives into the gravel, hands crunching against the tiny stones. She shrieks, shrill and loud with surprise, narrowly avoiding tasting the water of a murky puddle in front of her. She hears Kiyoko’s footsteps halt as the sting kicks in, an involuntary hiss escaping her as she sits back on her feet, knees digging into the mud. Looking at her palms, flecked with cuts and gravel stuck like glass, she shudders, cold and wet and inexplicably lonely. 

“Hitoka,” Kiyoko breathes, kneeling down next to her and looking at her hands. Yachi protests weakly, the ground is filthy, will ruin her nice running leggings with soakers and stains, she’ll be fine, but Kiyoko pays her no mind, unstrapping her water bottle from her leg and pouring it over her palms. Yachi hisses as the dirt washes away, leaving her hands raw and numb. 

“Are you okay?” Kiyoko asks her, looking up from her hands to meet her eyes. 

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Yachi tells her, nodding. Kiyoko stares at her with worry evident in her eyes, reaches forwards and brushes a strand of hair behind Yachi’s ear.

“Do you want to walk the rest of the way back? We aren't very far from the flat,” Kiyoko tells her.

Yachi shakes her head and smiles. “No, I can jog. Don’t worry.”

Kiyoko’s face falters for a moment before she nods in acceptance, helping Yachi up by the arm. They both rise to a stand, choosing instead to look at each other for a moment. It’s getting colder, and the wind continues to rip through them with too much vigour for nature to be considered gentle. Yachi laughs lightly through the rain, tucking her hair behind her ear again— _why won’t it stay?_ and turns to continue forwards.

Her knees ache from the fall, and straightening them stretches what will be bruises in a way that’s slightly less comfortable than she’d like. As Yachi picks up pace, she notices Kiyoko slowing down to stand beside her, and if her gut twists, Yachi has no idea if it is in self pity or adoration. With rainwater slick against her skin and palms still pricked with blood, Yachi forces her mind blank, runs a little faster, and focuses on Kiyoko beside her.

Everything feels _more_ as they slow in approach of the town, where trail turns to street turns to road and sidewalk, leading the girls to their apartment downtown. The rush of cars driving past, the once calming drone of rain now an arsenal of drums pounding down throughout the city. Yachi allows herself to finally slow to a walk, Kiyoko doing much the same beside her, brushing shoulders and backs of hands together in a plea for closeness.

“I’d hold your hand,” Kiyoko says, voice gentle, barely audible over the rain. “But I don’t want to hurt it anymore than it already is.”

Yachi turns her head to look at Kiyoko, taking in the blush of her cheeks, the stray hairs plastered to her forehead. With a soft smile, Yachi links their arms together instead, resting her head on Kiyoko’s shoulder. It doesn't give the warmth either desire, but the touch is enough to ward off things left unsaid, to defuse what tension lingers in the silence between them.

“Do you want to stop for coffee?” Kiyoko asks as they pass through the streets, steps lazy and slow, so much unlike the men and women running past with jackets pulled over head, anxious to beat the storm.

“Doesn’t that beat the purpose of going for a run?” Yachi questions, tilting her chin to look up at Kiyoko, who shakes her head.

“The purpose was to spend time with you,” Kiyoko explains. “I didn’t expect the rain to get this bad.”

As if to make point of her words, the clouds rumble, thunder groaning over their heads, creaking like buildings in the winter or ladders unsteady. Yachi laughs, airy and faint, blinking water droplets from her eyes as the downpour grows stronger.

“I stand corrected,” Kiyoko muses. “We should probably head home.”

Together, arm in arm, they walk the rest of the way home. It’s still raining, downpour hard enough to be louder than a jet engine or a thousand cicada beetles, running down their facesand necks, leaving a perpetual chill to their skin. There isn’t a rush anymore— world moving in slow motion all around them. Cars roar past, people dart like stray cats from the rain, wringing out hair and coats and tails in desperate loathing of the weather. Yachi wonders, if it were any other day, would that be them, laughing and giggling like school aged teens? The storm turns back the clock of their lives, opens the world up like a time capsule and shows them everything they once were, that they still have. Inside, Yachi aches, out of something nostalgic in the way spring forces her to remember, to worry. 

Kiyoko must sense some kind of tension from her rigid frame, because she slips her arm from the loop with Yachi’s and moves it to rest on her hip, guiding her inside of their apartment with a touch so light, Yachi wonders if it really exists. It’s that kind of thinking, she realizes, that got her to worrying in the first place. Observing, analyzing, adjusting, overanalyzing, obsession over little movements most people never thought worth their while. Yachi’s hands shake, and they sting and they burn and she's so suddenly _cold_ despite finally making it to the warmth of their small studio apartment.

Wordlessly, Kiyoko guides her to the kitchen, neither bothering to flick on the lights as Yachi sits atop the counter beside the sink, Kiyoko running the water. It’s tender, how soft her hands are as she tends to them with the disinfectant kept under the sink, with parted lips and glasses covered in drops of rain. Yachi wants to move to wipe them dry, but Kiyoko’s got her hands in her own, putting some kind of salve over the little cuts before wrapping bandages on her palms. 

And somehow, the silence is louder than any rainstorm or bought of thunder, somehow not speaking hurts more than the gravel stuck in her hands. Yachi’s breath is shaky as she exhales, falling just short of natural as Kiyoko rests her forehead on Yachi’s collarbone, breathing warm and deep as her arms wrap around her shoulders.

“You can tell me what’s worrying you,” Kiyoko whispers, looking up to face her. “You know I don’t mind.”

Yachi bites the inside of her cheek, tasting iron and wishing for a way to speak without her voice shaking. In the end, necessity wins out, and she finds words rising from the back of her throat, forming in breathy syllables loud through the silence.

“I don’t want us to grow apart,” Yachi tells her. “But I don’t— I can’t hold you back. I don’t want you to leave me behind, but I want you to go on ahead. And I hate it, because I’m being selfish, and I don’t want to be selfish—”

“You aren't being selfish, Hitoka,” Kiyoko assures her, running her fingers through the damped strands of her hair. “I don’t want us to grow apart either.”

“And that means staying together, and going on dates, but you’re gonna be meeting your new law friends and commuting across town and I don’t want to be the thing keeping you from going to better things.”

By now, Yachi’s breaths are speeding up, anxiety gripping at her muscles and pulling them tight. Kiyoko looks at her with softened eyes, wipes the water from her cheek and presses their foreheads together.

“You’re the best thing that I have right now,” Kiyoko says. Yachi moves with quivering limbs to wrap her arms around her waist, bringing them close. “And I’m not going to give you up for anything, and I won’t _need_ to give you up for anything.”

Yachi stills her tremors. “Really?” she asks, eyes wide and hopeful.

“Of course,” Kiyoko reaffirms. “And you can always tell me if you’re worried, right?”

Yachi lifts her mouth into the smallest workings of a smile. “Of course,” she repeats, no louder than what Kiyoko needs to hear, a whisper above the thunder and downpour outside of their window. 

—

It’s never sunny when they run together, but when Kiyoko comes home after a day of class, Yachi is waiting with her sneakers on. The wind blows through her sweater, chills her to the bone. Autumn means the leaves have long since turned red, means that the markets are displaying the year’s harvest in plenty. Yachi and Kiyoko run the trails side by side, laughter idle, footsteps quick. Yachi is better at keeping up than she was before, but Kiyoko still has to slow her pace for Yachi to stay near. Neither mind— it’s become more of a routine than an occasion, clockwork, a certainty in a world where nothing is certain. Yachi watches Kiyoko slow her pace to a walk and follows in suit, interlocking hands and drawing each other close.

Whether spring blooms or winter falls, whether summer sings or autumn drifts, they’ll walk together, side by side, hand in hand. Even if the sun doesn't shine, even when the trail runs out.

**Author's Note:**

> as always, kudos and comments are appreciated !!! talk hq gals with me on tumblr @ spacegaykj


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